Since 2013 "red line" crisis, Russia is a key player in East Med. But so are a few others... THREAD on an exceedingly messy situation, with 2 loose groups: 1.Russia, Egypt, Israel, Haftar, UAE, KSA, Greece, Cyprus; 2. Turkey, Siraj, Qatar. NATO members on opposite sides. 1/3 https://twitter.com/ulrichspeck/status/1277980873271328771

Ditto,strategic partners Russia+Turkey are in 2 different groups. And Israel is a staunch US ally...
Each of these 2 groups is "united" by a heady brew of interests: religion (Brothers vs Salafs), energy (gas), EEZ & territorial, history (incl competing neo imperial revivals) 2/3

not to mention plain vanilla geopolitics. And I've kept it simple (I didn't mention Syria, Iran). These crosscurents are getting ever more dangerous: lots of room for conflict between heavily armed contenders. US,EU,NATO,France, Italy should avoid adding fuel to these fires 3/3